It’s a story pulled straight out of today’s headlines: Supposedly no one reads.

The next generation believes words and text are pitiful cousins to pictures, heralding the end of literature and all complex abstract thought, which in turn leads to the end of civilization as we know it.

That last apocalyptic part isn’t exactly shown in this new Fred Schepisi movie, but the dramatic consequences of a growing disinterest in the word is a major concern for Jack Marcus (Clive Owen), an English teacher at an upscale prep school.

Jack is your classic creative burnout.

A published author who was once hailed as the next T.S. Eliot, Jack’s been running short of inspiration while drinking tall vodkas for years now.

He sits in his classroom and berates the kids for being so blasé but does nothing to jumpstart their intellect.

We know Jack is on thin ice with the school trustees.

We also sense he’s just waiting for the right moment to stomp his foot down with suicidal intent.

The only thing that could possibly save him is the love of a good woman, who rather fortuitously shows up in the first act with a cane and an equal amount of attitude.

Dina Delsanto is the new art teacher who still carries the fresh scent of celebrity, even though she, too, is suffering from an inability to create.

Delsanto suffers from rheumatoid arthritis. Painting is becoming increasingly difficult and without being able to express herself, Delsanto is staring down the same black hole as Jack — only she refuses to jump in.

She is light. He is dark, and while romance seems just a kiss away, Schepisi (Six Degrees of Separation) makes us wait for the inevitable union because this Gerald Di Pego (Sharky’s Machine, Phenomenon) script wants to hash out the war between words and pictures.

Using a school contest as the central device, Jack and Delsanto lead opposing teams in a battle to prove what form of human expression is most valuable and most meaningful: words or pictures.

It’s all relatively predictable for anyone who’s ever seen Good Will Hunting or Dead Poets Society, or any episode of Love Boat, for that matter, because Words and Pictures suffers from an inherent ennui with form.

The movie feels hampered by its own meter, some invisible journeyman need to hit each scene on schedule, which undercuts its secret message of personal liberation and creative expression.

Yet, it still works for two big reasons. First, it suggests that you don’t have to make great art to appreciate it, and second, we’re watching Clive Owen and Juliette Binoche seduce each other.

These two veterans create screen magic every time the camera finds their handsome faces.

They bring palpable, moving truth to even the most hackneyed material and make it feel real and honest.

It’s enough to help us transcend the after-school-special tone of the Vancouver-shot feature and make us ponder the movie’s words and pictures from a different, emotionally literate, perspective.

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